Labels We Love – Warners

Black Sabbath– Sabotage

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  • Sabotage debuts on the site with solid Double Plus (A++) grades or BETTER on both sides of this original Palm Tree pressing
  • The sound is lively, punchy, and powerful – with all due respect, it should murder whatever copies you may have
  • If you want to hear this music explode out of the speakers and come to life the way the band wanted you to hear it, this record will do the trick
  • 4 1/2 stars: “…the real revelation on Sabotage is Ozzy Osbourne, who turns in his finest vocal performance as a member of Black Sabbath. Really for the first time, this is the Ozzy we all know, displaying enough range, power, and confidence to foreshadow his hugely successful solo career.”

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Christopher Cross / Self-Titled

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Pure Pop Albums Available Now

  • With a STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) side two mated a superb Double Plus (A++) side one, this original Warner Bros. pressing of Cross’s debut LP is practically as good a copy as we have ever heard
  • The sound is full, rich, lively and Tubey Magical in the best tradition of late-70s pop productions
  • The sound may be too glossy for some, but we find that on the best copies that sound works just fine
  • This is the album that swept the Grammy awards with songs like “Never Be The Same,” “Sailing” and “Ride Like The Wind”
  • 4 1/2 stars: “While the hits like the dreamy ‘Sailing’ and the surging ‘Ride Like the Wind’ deserved all the attention, they’re hardly the only highlights here — to borrow a sports metaphor, this has a deep bench, and there’s not a weak moment here.”
  • In our opinion, Dream Weaver is his best sounding album, and probably the only Gary Wright record you’ll ever need. Click on this link to see more titles we like to call one and done.

If you like Michael McDonald, Toto, The Doobies, Hall and Oates, The Bee Gees and countless other bands we have lovingly found a home for on our site, you will no doubt find much to like here. A guilty pleasure, you say? When a record sounds this good there is nothing to feel guilty about.

Besides Michael McDonald‘s amazing background vocals, listen for the contribution Michael Omartian (the producer) makes on the keyboards. The keyboards more than the guitars are really the driving force behind these songs. If you hear some Aja in his playing, that’s because he played on Aja too. He was also instrumental in many of the Direct to Discs Sheffield made, I’ve Got the Music in Me probably being the best known of the batch.

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Paul Simon – Graceland

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Hot Stamper Pressings of Graceland Available Now


  • With two outstanding Double Plus (A++) sides, you’ll have a hard time finding a copy that sounds remotely as good as this vintage pressing – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Richer and smoother, two important qualities all the best pressings must have, yet still clear and resolving – this is the sound you want for Graceland
  • Guaranteed to trounce the well-reviewed but nevertheless awful Heavy Vinyl LP in every way, or your money back and the shipping is on us
  • There’s a delicate, extended top end on this pressing that simply does not exist on the new reissue
  • 5 stars: “An enormously successful record, Graceland became the standard against which subsequent musical experiments by major artists were measured.”

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Bonnie Raitt / Self-Titled – Our Shootout Winner (with Liner Notes)

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Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Bonnie Raitt

The average Green Label Warner Bros. copy we played was lackluster to say the least.

The words on some of my notes read flat, veiled, dry, dark, edgy.

[Many years later we would characterize the above shortcomings as the Warner Bros. House Sound.]

None too promising, but we persevered and found a good one.

The reissues we heard tended to be modern and thin. Definitely not our sound. 

Bonnie Raitt fans take note: This album did not sell well. It appears that it never even charted, which means that original copies are hard to come by.

On top of that, clean ones tend to be expensive and prices are climbing.

With those things considered, it is unlikely we would ever do this shootout again.

Side One

A++. By track two the sound is rich and solid, yet clear. Lovely Tubey Magic and an unprocessed live quality make this one sound about as right as it’s going to get. The drums are especially real sounding, with little in the way of EQ and compression (not that those are bad things).

The rich piano and vocals on track three seal the deal — It’s Super Hot.

Note that the first track, a cover of Bluebird, was a bad idea from the start. The sour sound did it no favors either.

Side Two

A++. Yes, it’s a dead room, but on the best pressings there is still ambience and space to be heard. 

The vocals, often edgy on other copies, were not edgy here. The sound is rich and clear, the ideal combination.

Based on what were the winners of this shootout, this album should sound better this way:

For those of you who might be interested in finding their own Hot Stamper pressings of other titles, we here provide more moderately helpful title specific advice.

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The Doobie Brothers – Minute By Minute

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  • A Minute By Minute like you’ve never heard, with stunning Nearly Triple Plus (A++ to A+++) sound on both sides of this original Warner Bros. pressing – just shy of our Shootout Winner
  • An audiophile quality pop music production as close to perfect as one could possibly wish for, thanks to Ted Templeman and Donn Landee
  • 4 stars: “…this is where the ‘new’ Doobie Brothers really make their debut, with a richly soulful sound throughout and emphasis on horns and Michael McDonald’s piano… It’s still all pretty compelling even if its appeal couldn’t be more different from the group’s earlier work. The public loved it, buying something like three million copies, and the recording establishment gave Minute by Minute four Grammy Awards, propelling the group to its biggest success ever.”

This is undoubtedly the band’s masterpiece, assuming you’re a Michael McDonald fan, and we very much are fans here at Better Records. We can now definitively say that the quality of the sound matches the quality of the music. What a wonderful sounding pop record. This is Donn Landee at his best — tonally correct, spacious, clear and sweet, with big bass and vocal choruses that can really take off when called upon. With Ted Templeman running the show this is an Audiophile Quality Pop Music Production that’s as close to perfect as one has any right to expect. (more…)

Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris – Trio

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  • This original Warner Bros. pressing (one of only a handful of copies to hit the site in nearly three years) boasts solid Double Plus (A++) grades or close to them on both sides
  • Big, rich, smooth, and sweet (particularly on side two), how did George Massenburg pull off this kind of analog sound in 1987?
  • We don’t know, but we do know good sound when we hear it, and we heard remarkably good sound on this side two, with side one not far behind
  • 4 1/2 stars: “…that rare example of an all-star collaborative effort that truly shows everyone involved to their best advantage, and it ranks with the best of all three headliners’ work.”

With three brilliant and accomplished singers harmonizing in the studio you can imagine that faultless midrange tonality is key to the best copies, and you would be right.

Some copies had the girls’ sounding a bit dark and veiled. Some had them a bit thin and bright. The Goldilocks Principle comes into play here as it does in so many of our shootouts: the best copies find the right balance of richness and clarity. (more…)

The Faces – A Nod Is As Good As A Wink

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  • Two excellent WB Green Label sides, both with Double Plus (A++) sound from start to finish – The Faces are rockin’ their asses off on this copy
  • Punchy, solid and rich through and through, with driving energy like nothing you’ve ever heard from the band
  • Impossibly quiet vinyl for a Green Label original – good luck finding one that plays this well (and sounds anything like this)
  • 5 stars: “[It] doesn’t feel cobbled together and it serves up tremendous song after tremendous song… It’s another classic — and when you consider that the band also had Long Player to their credit and had their hands all over Every Picture in 1971, it’s hard to imagine another band or singer having a year more extraordinary as this.”

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Lowell George – Thanks I’ll Eat It Here

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  • A stunning copy and only the second to hit the site in years, here with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • We’re huge fans of this album and a pressing like this lets the natural quality of the recording shine through
  • We don’t imagine we’ll be tracking down too many copies of this so if you’re a fan, scoop this one up!
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Lowell’s style is so distinctive and his performances so soulful, it’s hard not to like this record if you’ve ever had a fondness for Little Feat.”

This kind of recording quality was abandoned decades ago, but there was a time — I’m old, I remember it — when engineers actually tried to produce recordings with this kind of rich, sweet, thoroughly analog sound. 1979, the year of this album’s release, is right at the tail end of it. Why do you think so much of our Hot Stamper output covers the decade that stretched from the late ’60s to the late ’70s? Only one reason: that’s where some of the best sound can be found. (It’s a bit like Willie Sutton’s famous answer to why he robbed banks, “because that’s where the money is.”)

Which is taking the long way round in saying that this recording has a healthy dose of analog Tubey Magic, in places maybe even a bit too much, as the sound can sometimes get too thick and overly rich, like a cake with too much frosting.

The better copies keep that wonderful analog smoothness and freedom from artificiality, adding to it the life and energy of classic rock and roll. Yes, you can have it all — rich analog sound that jumps out of the speakers! Just listen to those horns on “Honest Man” — that is the sound we are looking for on an album like this.

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Prince – Purple Rain

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  • A stunning 2-pack of one of Prince’s True Classics, with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on side two of disc two and Double Plus (A++) sound on side one of disc one
  • These copies of Prince’s legendary 1984 release are big and rich, with rock solid energy to beat the pants off of any pressings you have ever heard
  • Clean and clear and open are nice qualities to have, but rich and smooth are a lot harder to come by on this record – and here they are!
  • 5 stars: “Purple Rain finds Prince consolidating his funk and R&B roots while moving boldly into pop, rock, and heavy metal with nine superbly crafted songs… a stunning statement of purpose that remains one of the most exciting rock & roll albums ever recorded.”

The better copies, like these two, sound pretty much the way the better copies of most Classic Rock records sound: tonally correct, rich, clear, sweet, smooth, open, present, lively, big, spacious, Tubey Magical, with breathy vocals and little to no spit, grit, grain or grunge.

That’s the sound of ANALOG, and the better copies of Purple Rain have that sound.

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Van Morrison – Saint Dominic’s Preview

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  • A Saint Dominic’s Preview like you’ve never heard, with solid Double Plus (A++) sound throughout this early Green Label pressing – fairly quiet vinyl too
  • It’s unusual (to say the least) to find copies of Moondance or Astral Weeks that sound anything like the better copies of Saint Dominic’s Preview (or His Band and Street Choir, an equally good recording)
  • One of the better sounding Van Morrison albums, thanks to the superb engineering skills of Donn Landee at Wally Heider’s and elsewhere
  • Marks in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these vintage LPs – there simply is no way around them if the superior sound of vintage analog is important to you
  • 5 stars in Rolling Stone: “The coexistence of two styles on the same record turns out to be very refreshing; they complement each other by underscoring the remarkable versatility of Van’s musical imagination… the best-produced, most ambitious Van Morrison record yet released.”

We’ve been huge fans of this album for ages and don’t understand why it doesn’t get more respect. This is the album that comes right after Tupelo Honey and His Band And The Street Choir, so that should tell you something.

The piano has real weight, the bottom end is solid, and the brass sounds lively and rich, never squawky. (more…)